THE top o’ the marnin’ to yez!” Billy called to the Duke the next morning as the first faint streaks of dawn tinged the east with a ruddy glow.
Goats are no sluggards about arising. In fact, they are wide awake with the first crowing of the first chanticleer.
“The same to you, and may this be your lucky day,” was the Duke’s equally amiable reply.
“I’ve been thinking,” said Billy, “while I’ve been waiting for you to waken—I myself roused hours ago—that I may as well take myself off before the keepers make their rounds. I suppose they come early. Am I right?”
“Well, yesterday it was about six, and I suppose that is the usual time.”
“Then I’ll be up and away, with many, many thanks, my dear Duke, for the pleasant time you’ve given me. I cannot express my appreciation in mere words.”
“But, Billy, do have just a bite of breakfast first,” urged his host. “Surely you can stay long enough for that! See, here’s some of that tender clover hay that you enjoyed so much last night.”
“Now you mention it, I believe I will, though I’ve not any appetite so early in the day.”
Stepping up in front of the rudely constructed manger, Billy began to nibble at the hay. As he continued, the Duke watched him out of the corner of his eye, first glancing at Billy, now busily gorging himself, and then again at the rapidly diminishing pile of hay, then at the hay and again back at Billy. He decided to remonstrate and began:—
“Billy!”
No response.
“Oh, I say, Billy!”
“Um,” from the occupied goat.
“But Billy! I say, Bill-ee!”
“Uh-huh, what is it?”
“You remind me of Mrs. Treat.”
“I do? How?”
“You remind me of Mrs. Treat and a saying that’s so often on her lips.”
“She’s most always talking, and so it’s not strange I don’t even now see any connection.”
“You know,” the Duke explained, “she says she’d much rather feed six men who confessed they were hungry as bears than one who declared he couldn’t eat a bite.”
“Well?” queried the goat, still busy at the manger.
“I’ve begun to think it ought to be a dozen to one when the proverb is applied to goats!”
“You do, eh? Which reminds me of a story.”
“Out with it then,” commanded the Duke.
“There was once a pet calf on the Treat farm, or so I’ve been told, who was such a greedy youngster that Tom, his owner, never dared to set the pail of milk down and leave it for him to drink. If he did, that calf would invariably plunge his nose to the very bottom, and in his unseemly haste would bunt the pail, over it would go and he would lose all.
“One day Tom carried a large wooden pail of rich, sweet milk out to the young apple orchard where the calf was kept with two pet lambs, and he waited until the calf should finish his drinking. Now that calf plunged down and drank deep and long, never stopping until he was compelled to raise his head for air. And then how he spluttered and blew the milk out through his nostrils! In his hurry to recover his breath, some milk went down his wind-pipe and such a fuss! He commenced to choke and cough, and his fat sides began to bloat. Tom raced to the barn for Chris, the hired man, who hurried to the rescue. As soon as he saw the calf’s lolling tongue, wobbly legs and bulging sides, he went for the buggy whip and they ran that down his throat. Then, breaking off an apple branch, Chris used it to urge the calf to keep on the move and around and around that orchard they circled until every bit of the bloating had disappeared. Let—me—see,” pondered the goat, as if racking his brains, “I believe they do say his name was the Duke of Windham. And now that very self-same goat dares to stand up and preach about the wickedness of greediness! Oh me!”
Billy pretended to be boiling over with rage, though really not a whit disturbed, and, taking the very last wisp of hay in his mouth, chewed it slowly, as if it was too good to lose any of the pleasure by hurrying, all the time glowering frightfully at the Duke.
“You’re a heathen! You’ve no glimmering of the first rules of politeness, and deserve just this—”
But the nimble Duke was ready for a frolic, and cleared Billy’s back as neatly as most boys do when playing leap-frog.
Over and over Billy charged, but each time Duke escaped by using the light leap. They were in the very midst of the fun, and had forgotten all about the dreaded morning visit of the keeper, when the rattle of a key in the padlock gave warning. Billy heard—and instantly Billy knew what it meant. In pure self-defence, to escape sure capture and tedious imprisonment, the goat backed to the farther corner and quickly made ready.
Back swung the gate and in came a tall, slender youth. Billy felt a qualm or two about his real right to attack so delicate a boy, but when he saw the lad take a glance around and quickly turn to flee at sight of a goat cornered as he was, he decided such cowardly action deserved a drubbing, and with a bound he took the fellow just below the knees. His joints worked beautifully, Billy thought, for he collapsed in a heap on Billy’s broad back, and his long arms flew out for some support, and his longer legs first dangled on the ground and then flailed the air, conforming to every motion of the beast beneath him.
“Ouch! Ouch!” groaned Billy, after having made several uneven leaps and bounds, the better to show his rider the advantage of a goat over all other steeds.
“Ouch! Ouch! He’s holding on by my coat! He’s pulling my hair out by its very roots. He has no humanity—not a bit!” wailed Billy.
That the tables were merely turned had not occurred to Billy, nor the fact that he was receiving only a fraction of the discomfort he was giving.
“I’ll not stand it! I’ll not have it! Ouch! Ouch! He’s caught my tail, he has! Ouch!”
Billy was mad. Not angry, but furiously mad. And gathering all his strength, he made one high backward leap, turned a complete somersault, and his victim described a circle, too, landing in a deep mud puddle, left by the storm of the day before.
The fellow had no more than realized what had befallen him than Billy was upon his feet and charging at him. That he had chosen a muddy seat seemed no very great disadvantage to Billy. In fact, he now determined to give him a mud bath, and first he prodded him on one side and then on the other. All the fight the fellow ever possessed had fled when he saw that magnificent pair of horns bearing down on him. He screened his eyes with his hands and gave himself up to the tender mercies of the enemy, rolling this way and that at Billy’s pleasure.
“He’s so deep in the mire that he may not be able to get out,” thought Billy, when he himself began to pant for breath. “It’s only fair to put him on his feet, I suppose,” and so he hooked him by the coat, and with a toss that required every atom of his strength—though Billy never admitted the fact—the boy was up once more, though oozing with mud.
“He’ll never show himself to his chief in that state. It will take an hour to make him presentable, and in the meantime I must make tracks. Still, I’m not one to run from danger, and it may be the fellow will never report his experience.”
Billy had studied human nature enough to know that one does not willingly tell a story in which he does not play a creditable part.
“I’ll not dare to show myself in this vicinity to-night, though,” he meditated. “That means that I shall have to seek new lodgings. I wonder who will be so kind—but let me think! Toppy also came to be exhibited. It’s no more than her plain duty to entertain me one night. I’ll hunt her up!”
Putting this resolution into action, he hurried down the Cattle Row. At the farther end was a large barn, now his objective point.
Long before break of day, the coming of the morning had been noisily heralded by the cocks, and Billy knew that all the fuss came from this building.
“One thing I forgot to ask the Duke, and that is how long this county jollification lasts. Toppy surely won’t know—it’s her first experience here, as she’s nothing but a pullet. Of course, the Duke is not much better—nothing but a calf—but at least he could inquire of some of his older neighbors.”
As the goat approached the barn which had been temporarily turned into the exhibition house for the chickens, he made a wide detour, circled round it twice and reconnoitered thoroughly, to reassure himself that it was altogether safe for him to enter. Seeing no one in sight, he hurried back to the main entrance, bent on finding Toppy.
“Of course she’ll see me as soon as I enter and will fly straight to me. Toppy has been my vassal ever since I saved her from the hawk down in the wood lot when she was just a scrawny, ugly chick getting her pin feathers.”
Billy was by this time well inside the building, but no flutter of wings or delighted cackle from Toppy greeted him. Not a chicken was busily scratching in the deep straw that covered the rough flooring. Instead there were little, square boxes—piles and piles of them—set neatly in rows one upon the other, each with a wire screen front, and each containing a chicken. Poor things! cooped up in tiny houses that were scarcely large enough to permit them to turn around without stepping in the dish holding their portion of water for the entire day.
Billy’s kind heart bubbled over with rage at the sight, and his eyes kindled at the thought that Toppy was in one of these prison houses.
“Our Toppy, who has always had the freedom of the Farm, to be shut up in such a bird cage!” he lamented, waxing indignant at the situation.
Up and down he walked, looking in each box, always hoping that the next one would hold his feathered friend. Big Buff Cochins, tiny Bantams, so full of fighting zeal, Wyandottes, Speckled Hamburgs, every kind was there but Plymouth Rocks.
“I’ll search all morning if necessary,” he vowed, as he turned into the third aisle.
Carefully he conducted his quest now, not merely casting careless glances up and down the long rows. Instead, he peered into every box, though it meant tedious and wearisome work, for at last he had reached that part of the exhibit devoted to the pretty Plymouth Rocks, all decked out in their Quakerish gray. The first three rows of boxes were easily inspected, being on Billy’s own level. The fourth and fifth tiers were a real problem, however, and caused the eager searcher much trouble. Each time he wished to look into one of these homes perched up so high, he had to rear up on his hind feet. This is not a natural position for four-footed animals, and Billy often lost his balance. He was afraid to use the boxes for support for his front legs, lest they might topple over and the consequent cackling and crowing of the terrified fowls put to rout his plan of rescue, for this his search for Toppy had now become.
Down, down, down went Billy’s heart as he progressed. Tears of vexation welled up in his eyes, for he was a very determined goat and disappointment was hard to bear.
“No use, I guess,” he decided, and he was hurrying along, glancing neither to the right nor to the left, but wholly bent on reaching the door quickly.
“Cluck, cluck! Cluck, cluck!” sounded a familiar call.
Billy stopped short.
“Cluck, cluck, cluck!” scolded the hen. “Billy Treat, turn back; turn right back, I say!”
“Why, Toppy girl!”
“No Toppy-girling me!” she responded, tossing her head saucily. “You were going right by with nary one word to me! I’ll not be wheedled into good nature by any of your soft words, Mr. Billy!”
“Didn’t you notice how sorrowful I looked?” he questioned.
“Sorry? Why, I thought you looked more like a whipped dog. Your poor stub of a tail lay down flat—and that is a pretty sure sign that you have been in some trouble.”
“I have been in trouble, but the trouble is you, Mistress Toppy. I’ve been hunting for you, and had just given up in deep despair.”
“What can I do for you?”
“Why, nothing. I thought I could do something for you.”
“Oh, Billy!”
“Don’t ‘Oh, Billy’ me!” he sniffed in high disdain.
“But, Billy dear,” she soothed, “you can be of such use to me just now! There’s a dear, say you’ll do it!”
“I’m not in the habit of refusing your requests, Biddykins,”—and this from Billy Whiskers, whom most animals thought so heartless and cruel! Which only proves the more conclusively that but the very closest of our friends ever know us through and through.
“Well, then,” clucked the Plymouth Rock beauty, “though they have labeled me with a blue tag it’s not worth the price of being caged like this. What I want you to do is to get me out of this box.”
“The very thing I meant to do!”
“Thanks! Thanks!” she clucked.
“Now to plan the details of the escape,” proceeded Billy. “Tell me, where is the door to your house?”
“The whole front is the door, kind sir,” she made reply, “and it’s most securely locked, I fear.”
“You’re sure?” for this would be a hard problem.
“Yes, sure of it. Every time they bring me fresh water and corn, the man turns the knob there on the left side.”
“Hump!” and Billy eyed the fastening.
“But you can very easily tear a place open in this wire screening that will be big enough for me to squeeze through. Oh, please say you can!” she pleaded.
“Better’n that I can do, Miss Toppy. Watch closely and you will see what will make your little eyes pop open wider than they’ve ever been before.”
Billy went up close to the Plymouth Rock’s tiny house, lowered his head, and after turning it this way and that, he stepped proudly back, bleating his satisfaction and pleasure.
“Step out, pretty Toppy, and enjoy a stroll about the grounds,” he invited.
“Step out? Step out?” she clucked indignantly. “I would if I could. Don’t make my life more unbearable than it is by such idle words!”
“But Toppy, I mean it. Come out! Your cage is a prison no longer. Hurry out of your cell and enjoy the fine morning with your friend.”
“You old torment!” Toppy scolded, and, forgetting the barrier between them, she fluffed up her feathers and flew at him to peck him on the nose, his tender spot.
Open flew the door and out tumbled the hen, fluttering wildly to the floor.
“Help! Help!” she cackled.
“You’re free, Toppykins!” congratulated her rescuer, “Hurrah, Hurrah!” he exulted.
“Free, you naughty fellow? Whoever was in a worse fix than I am this moment, I’d like to know?” was her inconsistent retort. “What do you propose doing with me now I’m out?”
“Do?” helplessly from Billy.
“You certainly must know I can’t wander around loose all day in this dreadful place. And I can’t travel all the way back to Cloverleaf Farm. What shall I do? Oh, dear, what shall I ever do?” she wailed.
“You’re a ninny, and that’s my opinion of you! Hop back into that thing and I’ll lock you up.”
“I will, you horrid Billy! I might have known better than to listen to any of your wild schemes,” and up she flew.
Billy wasted no time in closing the door—an easy task, but when one attempt failed to turn the wooden button that secured it, a wicked gleam leaped to his eye.
“Ha, ha! A good joke on the whimsical little lady! I’ll leave it unlocked. She is sure to have a most miserable day of it, and won’t she splutter when I tell her liberty was within her reach?” and chuckling to himself, he hurried off, unheeding Toppy’s plaintive calls for him to return.
“She has changed her mind once too often,” he mumbled, “Now she’ll pay for it.”